HARRY REDKNAPP questioned whether he had made the right decision to return to management after suffering his first defeat as QPR boss on Saturday.

His team lost at Newcastle, and it hit new boss Redknapp so hard that for 36 hours he could not talk to anyone.

He admitted that even his wife thought he might have been better off continuing with his sabbatical.

Redknapp said: “The journey home for me was like, ‘phew, ridiculous, terrible’. I get so low that it’s scary. Horrendous. You have to pick yourself up, but Saturday and Sunday are just a nightmare. You think, ‘Is it right. Is this worth it, after all’? When Sandra sees what I’m like at the weekend, yes she probably does think it would be better if I wasn’t back at work. The lows just aren’t right. It’s crazy. I never switch off.”

Redknapp was at training yesterday urging his players to build on beating Fulham 10 days ago. But he is also scouring the market for January 1.

Aston Villa striker Darren Bent is a key target, along with a loan deal for Liverpool’s Joe Cole and a move for Tottenham centre-back Michael Dawson.

He wants players to gamble like he did when replacing Mark Hughes in November and say, ‘Let’s save Rangers’. “I took a chance,” he said. “I thought, ‘OK, let’s see if we can do it’. They must do the same.”

“Come and play. Let’s pull something off that no one thinks we can do. It would be something you look back upon.”

Redknapp said former Chelsea striker Nicolas Anelka’s wage demands would be too rich and that he was not looking to bring in LA Galaxy striker Robbie Keane on a short-term loan.mouth, that day at Wigan I’ve never been happier when we won to stay up. It was a fantastic feeling for me and I’ll never forget that.

“At Portsmouth we got three players from Spurs, Noe Pamarot, Sean Davis, Pedro Mendes, and it was hard to convince them, but they weren’t playing at Tottenham so they came. They thought let’s go and play. And that’s what we’re looking for, good lads who you know can do well for you who want to come and play.

“There’s still lots of lads like that about. They are not all mercenaries. I need people that can come and do the job. I need people I can be sure about, I can’t be taking chances.

The journey home for me was like, ‘phew, ridiculous, terrible’. I get so low that it’s scary. Horrendous

Harry Redknapp

“I wouldn’t take anybody that they said ‘Harry there’s a great player playing in Argentina or somewhere.’ I’m not taking those gambles.

“I’ve got to get people that I know. If I’m wrong, I take the blame. It will be down to me if they come in and they are no good.

“You’re looking at players who may be out of contract at the end of the season, someone who is not in a team, who you know is a good player, who has been a good player for you. A player you have seen a lot of and you know or tried to sign before. But it isn’t easy getting people here when they see a league table is it?

Redknapp said former Chelsea striker Nicolas Anelka’s wage demands would be too rich for his blood and that he was not looking to bring in LA Galaxy striker Robbie Keane on a short-term loan.

“It’s a difficult one because if you go down what do you do? How do you pay someone like Anelka? There is no guarantee you will stay up if you take him is there?” he said.

“We will have to pay big wages if we are going to get some good players, that is for sure. In one or two cases. Not in every case. If we want someone on loan. We need to make sure that he is the right type and if he gives you value for money you don’t mind. It is when you don’t get value for money you get upset about it.”